The Nirmukta Freethought Community

I was reminded of this issue when Dr. Kamath sent his recent article to be posted. While looking for video content I remembered the revealing BBC documentary on Saibaba that aired in the UK and Canada, called 'The Secret Swami'. Many of you are probably familiar with the documentary, but for those of you who haven't watched it, here are links to all the 7 parts on youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BVEJDPrGpM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-Ajawd59RM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ag93TX6DI0w
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CROnyK2fzcs
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PHsxBEYI9g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Q4M2raOwPI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGZ3Bdjvg3I

There are many questions we can ask. For starters, this casts a shadow over Indian democracy. India is still at the very bottom of the list of democracies of the world when it comes to the issue of corruption in government. This documentary and the accusations are public news. Yet the politicians do not touch Sai Baba. The TV channels, including Doordarshan, remove the footage of his sleight of hand, covering up for this aging fraud and alleged rapist.

There are many other questions we can ask. Dr. Kamath's article makes a good case that this affinity that Indian politicians have for Saibaba is a sort of Stockholm Syndrome. I rather tend to agree with him on this.

Disclaimer: My thoughts on this are not fully reasoned out at this time . I'm merely seeking answers and hoping that you might have something to add to the discussion.

Hi Ajita, When I wrote that Indian political rulers have Stockholm syndrome, I was being facetious. For one to have this syndrome he/she must have suffered actual abuse in the hands of the abuser. In a sense, Sai Baba has screwed these knuckle-headed rulers royally!

Thanks Dr. Kamath. I realize also that 'syndrome' in medical terms is related to actual clinical symptoms.

To me the fact that Indian politicians are not looking into the child rape accusations, completely allowing this charlatan to dictate the law, is unbelievable. It is the sort of thing that should happen in dictatorships and religious theocracies, not in democracies. The thing to learn from this is that democracy is a constant struggle, and we people need to keep reminding our elected officials about what it means. Unfortunately, even educated Indians seem to not have any interest in being well-informed on their constitutional rights, which is why the politicians are able to get away with such abuse.

The problem is two fold: Indian politicians have no balls to face down charlatans like Sai Baba; and Indian intellectuals' allegiance is to decadent old Dharma, rather than to the Constitution of India. People have the mistaken idea that it is enough if they vote every five years to claim India is a democracy. What they don't know is that democracy requires citizens to struggle constantly to uphold the rule of law. Few in India have either the awareness or the energy to keep fighting for democratic processes. Another problem is that bureaucratic corruption drives people into the hands of people like Sai Baba, who cashes in on their misery by acting like a parallel government -supplying water to villages, etc. He breeds passivity and dependence in these people. Sad state of affairs. The conclusion is that intellectuals of India are totally bankrupt.

I read that Nirmukta is going to become a formal organisation soon. I would love to join. Is it possible for us as Nirmukta to bring a PIL against this decadent fraud? I would love to discuss what we could do about this.

The great B. Premanand of "The Indian Skeptic" had to go underground after his secretly filmed videos exposing Sai Baba of Puttaparthi (btw, whose feet I refused to touch much to the disappointment of my Mom and I was all of 11 yrs of age) whose cronies and aides have allegedly committed murders in their ashram-complex.

The politicans are stupid and/or greedy. Some of them are atheists in their personal lives, but have no qualms about using religion in politics. I felt sick to the stomach when I saw photos of the current Chief Minister of Maharashtra bowing at the feet of this Sai Baba who was a guest at his official residence.

For those who don't know, he calls himself Sai Baba after the original one at Shirdi, Maharashtra. The Sai Baba of Shirdi was a fakir who used to eat food given to him by villagers, lived in a mosque and died in rags. His spoken words recorded were "Sab ka malik ek". There was debate whether he was a Muslim or a Hindu after his death for the last rites. When I visited as a kid, it was a small hamlet with a rudimentary temple. Today it is a thriving small town with a successful "temple-casino complex" (term coined by Dr. Kamath). The temple trust has so much money, they were planning to build a solid gold life-size statue and throne for the fakir Sai Baba. As usual, Brahminism has taken over - wherever money is to be made.

What I see often, many anti-Sai propagandist rely upon unreliable sources and not interested to read the other side of the story. They often try to sound rational and hide in the guise of scientific affluence when making such claims, when in reality it is not the case.

Having made conclusion based on dubious ground and half-truth, they go on asking why the government or the legal body did not take action against such people and make another bunch of false allegations (unverified again). They think they are so intelligent (while in reality showing so much ignorance) they condemn the others as stupid, corrupt etc.

This only exposes their own negative mindset rather than doing any real damage to Sai Baba.

Contrary to such claims, real facts are reported in this website:

http://www.saisathyasai.com/

This site really exposes the fraud and false claims made by such anti-social agencies.

Some good materials to read are as follows:

The Rationalist And Christian Movements Against Sri Sathya Sai Baba
http://www.saisathyasai.com/baba/Ex-Baba...ments.html

Deceptive And Edited Movies & Video Clips On The ExBaba Website Against Sathya Sai Baba
http://www.saisathyasai.com/baba/Ex-Baba...ovies.html

There are more to it and I personally know many claims to be flawed and can be easily dismissed, but yet don't understand why people still can be influenced by such cheap propaganda.

In the end, there are only 2 possibilities that come out of these:

1. Those who blindly believe this propaganda and looses the chance to see the truth or benefit from the teaching, which could be live transforming.

2. Those who know the truth and do not buy into this propaganda and by following the teachings have gained so much benefit and transformation.

@mvish,

So do you believe that Sai Baba has mystical powers and is a form of "god", as he claims?

I have personally witnessed an act of deceit committed by him. Will let you know about it later.

(30-07-2010 05:07 PM)siddharth Wrote:  @mvish,

So do you believe that Sai Baba has mystical powers and is a form of "god", as he claims?

I have personally witnessed an act of deceit committed by him. Will let you know about it later.

@siddharth,
I have personally been to visit Sai Baba in Puttaparthi and have seen 1st hand the materialization of gold chain at close encounter.

About “god”, i am not sure why it is a controversial thing. Here god does not mean Christian perspective of god, but a Hindu perspective of God. Sai Baba himself says that everyone is god, but he or she does not realize it due to ignorance while he is realized.

Here is one of his quotes: “Truth can spread, just like love, and those souls who reach the more advanced stage along spiritual path can act as pathfinders or guides for others. They are living examples of God manifesting Himself in man at the highest levels, a goal which everyone should seek. That is why I tell you to keep good company, because such people can help you just by their presence and example.”

This video captures the essence of it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlH915HI-Y8

Hope it helps.

Materialization of gold chain. You have it, friends. End of discussion.

"Bin Science. This guy just pulled a gold chain off his arse!"

I say put these frauds in jail under IPC 420.

Quote:Here is one of his quotes: “Truth can spread, just like love, and those souls who reach the more advanced stage along spiritual path can act as pathfinders or guides for others. They are living examples of God manifesting Himself in man at the highest levels, a goal which everyone should seek. That is why I tell you to keep good company, because such people can help you just by their presence and example.”

What hollow statements come from the godmen..Is there any genuine benefit from such quotes/discourses? They just throw out some words.. "truth", "love"... What new concrete, verifiable truth/edification have they contributed?
I remember Tree Tree Ravi Shankar talk about about "A reporter asked me: whats special about breathing" in which he pulls out "love" out of nowhere... the #$^#$*

Quote:I have personally been to visit Sai Baba in Puttaparthi and have seen 1st hand the materialization of gold chain at close encounter.